


Frérin’s Slave Life

by RiverEagle



Series: Donnabelle [7]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Pre-The Hobbit, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 08:53:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6976333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiverEagle/pseuds/RiverEagle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How exactly did Frerin' become a slave after the Battle of Azanulbizar?  This is his story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Frérin’s Slave Life

**Author's Note:**

> (If I were to cast an actor to play Frérin, it would be Josh Holloway. He shares certain facial features similar to Richard Armitage and to Dean O’Gorman and Aiden Turner)
> 
> Dedicated to Anime Princess, who asked how Frérin and Donnabelle first became slaves.

Frérin, the second son of Thráin, of the line of Durin, woke cold and shivering.  There was a steady swaying of whatever form of transport he was in.  He blearily looked around the covering over him and thought that it was a wagon of some sort.  Shifting slightly, Frérin panicked when he felt the cold steal of chains grip at his wrists and ankles.  His hands were pulled up over his head and he noticed they were attached to one of the wagon walls.  The last thing he remembered was being with Fundin on the shores of Kheled-zâram, battling against the orcs that had taken over Moria before he was knocked unconscious defending Fundin’s body.

To go from the midst of battle to a covered wagon going to who knew where had Frérin apprehensive.  “Thorin?” the young, 48-year-old dwarf called out.  Perhaps the chains were there for his protection?  He was known to be a particularly  _bad_  patient when he was hurt.  And if he was cold and shivering, then he must have been seriously wounded in the battle.  But that wouldn’t explain why his hands and arms were tied above his head.  And  _to the wagon._

He looked up from his prone position when a rapping on wood came from somewhere near the back of the wagon.  His eyes widened slightly at the sight of a man that sat against the opening of the tarp.  From what the dwarf could see against the backlight from outside the wagon, a scar ran down the man’s left eye and cheek.  Frérin looked back at his bound hands and started shifting them to test the metal.  They were strong, but given enough time, the dwarf thought he could get out of them.

Frérin swallowed and stiffened when the man sharing the wagon with him got into his personal space and grabbed a hold of his braided beard.  His blue-grey eyes darkened as his face was pulled close to the man’s.

“Struggle and I’ll cut it off.”  The voice that issued from the human’s lips was rough and deep.  If Frérin had to guess at the man’s age, he would guess the boy was no more than five and twenty.  The dwarf ground his teeth but stopped struggling against his bonds.  “Good.  You understand Westron, dwarf.  Do you know what you are?”  Frérin remained stubbornly silent as he glared at the man that held his beard.  The man’s lips twitched slightly at the defiance he saw in the dwarf’s eyes.  “You are a slave, dwarf.  A slave of the Hounds of Esgaroth.”

The dwarf felt his eyes widen at that.  He started to pull at his wrist bonds again.  These men that had captured him, that most likely had taken his unconscious body from Kheled-zâram, were from Esgaroth?  For Frérin knew that the  _child_  in the wagon with him would not have been old enough to remember Esgaroth or Dale.  Even if the man were nine and twenty, he would not remember the Mountain in all of its glory.

Frérin had been nineteen when the dragon came, and his own memories of his childhood home were fading as much as he struggled to hold onto them.

And then, the dwarf stiffened as he felt the man pull at his beard again.  He was not going to break under the shaving of his beard.  He was  _not_  going to break.  The only sign of his distress was his eyes suddenly shutting down and becoming blank: and his arms straining to remain still.  Then came the smirk of his tormentor as the young slaver held up the braid that Frérin had so proudly worn ever since he could first braid his facial hair.  He did not let himself gaze upon the clasp that held the strands in place: the clasp that Thorin had given him just before the fall of Erebor.

“First this, dwarf.  Then those lovely braids in your hair.  We will break you.  And you will be a slave forever.”

But Frérin was already plotting his escape.  He would  _not_ be subjected to ridicule and torture for the remainder of his days.

**THTHTHTH**

His first opportunity came three days after his first conscious thought in the back of the wagon.  As the men were setting up camp on their way to the slave market, the dwarf slipped free of his chains and made quick work of the ones on his ankles.  There wasn’t a lot of cover for him to duck and hide behind, but he made for the closest outcropping of trees.

It did not help that he did not know where he was in Middle Earth.  Yet, if he could find his way back to the Misty Mountains, then he could find his way from there.  He could get back to Ered Luin and to his family.

But he did not get far before the men cornered him and had him wiped.  And the youngest of the ten men kept his word and stripped Frérin of his other braids.  In fact, the men took great pleasure in shaving Frérin of his long hair and beard before they grinned at the shamed dwarf.  They burnt his hair in their campfire that night and threw his beads aside.

Frérin trembled as he watched his hair burn.  It would take him  _years_  to grow his hair back to the length it had been.  There was no way he would be able to show his face around Ered Luin again until it grew back.  His beard he could live with: Thorin had shaved his beard short not long after they had lost Erebor to the dragon.  But his  _hair_.  It was unseemly for any dwarrow to have short hair past their first childhood years.  Even in morning.  The only time a grown dwarf would have a shaved head was when their clan had publicly shamed them for a major grievance against the whole tribe.  And then that dwarf would be banished.

He would  _not_  break.  He was one of Durin’s folk: the second-born prince of Erebor.  And yet, he could do  _nothing_  as he was beaten, belittled and shamed by slavers that hailed from Dale and Esgaroth.

**THTHTHTH**

Frérin attempted again to escape nearly a month after the slavers had captured him and got a little further in his second escape.  Yet the slavers had been expecting it and beat him within an inch of his life.

And  _that_  was when they finally broke him.  The Hounds of Esgaroth told him that though the dwarrow had won the Battle of Azanulbizar, it had come at a heavy price.  None of the Durin line survived, save Dís who had not ridden into war with her brothers, father and grandfather.  And it was only when they shared with the dwarf that there had been another dwarf that they thought he would like to know the fate of. A dwarf that went by the name of Dinna.

When the men saw they had Frérin’s attention, they proceeded to tell him how the dwarf had valiantly protected the unconscious form of her prince.  And had failed to stop an arrow from piercing her heart.  Nor did she have the strength to stop the men from gutting her open and leaving her to die a slow painful death while they carted him away.

Frérin felt his whole world shatter.  In the nearly five weeks he had been with the slavers, he was fighting so he could get back to his brother, his  _family_ , but most importantly, to Dinna.  His One.  He had not been aware  _she_  had followed him into battle.  Nor that she had given up her life so that he could live.  Dinna, his precious Dinna, was gone.  There was no future for him without her in it.  He hadn’t even had the chance to court her properly.

**THTHTHTH**

He never fought against his captors again, and they toyed with him for a year before they tired of it.  It was not much fun for them without someone who fought back.  So they sold him to his next owners at a slave market in the south, in the kingdom just south of Gondor.

 

**THTHTHTH**

Frérin did not hear anything of his kin for nearly 100 years.  He worked hard for his many different masters during that time, and most of them had been good to him.  There had been no reason for him to leave the safety of their homes that they provided him with.  In fact, he knew he had a better life as a slave with food, clothing and shelter being provided for him than the memories he had of the years between when the dwarrow of Erebor lost their home and the Battle of Azanulbizar.

Those twenty-eight years had not been fun.  It had been very difficult to find enough food for everyone to survive the winters, and there had not been enough furs to go around keeping everyone warm.  He remembered losing many good dwarrow during the coldest parts of the winter.  And a fair number of dwarflings too.  They had almost lost Dís during that first winter after Smaug came.  He may not have met Dinna if it had not been for the fact the dwarrow  _needed_ to conserve heat and her father had been one of Thráin’s royal guards.  So her family had joined their family circle.

As a slave, he had no pressures but to perform his tasks to the best of his ability.  So it was with great trepidation that Frérin was introduced to the new slave dwarf his master had purchased to help with the forge.  A dwarf who had been taken from the Blue Mountains under his brother’s rule.

Frérin felt hope bloom in his chest at that.  His brother, Thorin, had survived!  And he heard of his nephews, born to him of Dís and a dwarf he barely remembered named Víli.  The elder nephew, if Frérin was to believe Starur, looked like a younger version of him.  After one hundred years, the dwarf began to remember what it was like to have something to fight for.

It would take him nearly seven years to work for enough money to buy his freedom from his master.  And just as he was about to approach his latest master (the child of his former master), a new house slave was purchased.  Frérin was asked to introduce the slave to its duties and was told that he would find it in the living area.

The dwarf did not think much of the request, as he had done the same thing many times over in the past.  But when he stepped into the living area and looked around for the newest addition to the household, he had to squash the anger that burned within him.  The new slave was only but a child!  A small, scared,  _lost_  halfling child by the look of her feet.  And he knew there was no way in all of the Arda that he was going to leave when there was a  _child_  he could stay and protect.

Whoever took the child from their home, Frérin swore, was going to pay.

  **THTHTHTH**

He later found out her name was Donnabelle, and she had been taken from outside her home in Hobbiton after her grandfather’s party.  She’d been a curious little thing and had just strayed too far from her parents’ watchful gaze.  By the time they realized she was gone, it had been too late for the hobbits to follow and rescue her.  So he took it upon himself to see that she was freed and was returned safely to her family.  No matter how long it took for him to see that promise fulfilled.


End file.
